Tag Archives: cake

I wasn’t always a gin fan. I suppose as you grow up and become more of an adult you end up trying new things more – your taste buds change. It’s kind of fascinating, in a way, the way you can mould your taste buds. The bitter, refreshing tang – the sharpness of the gin cut by the fizz of tonic with a subtle twist of lime – terrific. It’s certainly my drink of choice now.

So when I stumbled upon a recipe incorporating one of my favourite drinks into a cake I had to jump at the chance to bake it.

For this I bought good gin (Bombay Sapphire) but that’s also because I was going to make a few drinks out of it too! The original recipe can be found here – I have made my own comments on the recipe below. This cake came back with great reviews from family and friends so I urge you to try it for yourself!

Gin & Tonic Cake

You will need:

For the cake:

4 eggs

Butter

Sugar

Self-raising flour

2 lemons – zest and juice of 1 lemon

3-4 shots of your favourite gin

For the syrup:

3-4 shots of gin

150g granulated sugar

Juice from 1 lemon

A dash of tonic water (I used a mini can)

Preheat your oven to 180C. Prepare a loaf tin by buttering the bottom and sides or by lining with baking paper.

Weigh the eggs – whatever weight the eggs come to on the scale will be the same weight as the butter, sugar and flour.

In a large mixing bowl or mixer add the caster sugar and butter, cream together until the mixture is light and fluffy.

Add the eggs in one at a time until fully combined. Sieve the flour into the mixture slowly and add in the lemon zest.

Pour in 3-4 shots of gin and the juice of one lemon, mixing until the batter is smooth.

Pour into the lined tin and bake in the oven for 35-40 minutes. Note: I allowed for 45 minutes but would personally aim for 50-55 minutes as my base was slightly underdone.

To make the syrup: Mix the remaining shots of gin, granulated sugar, lemon juice and tonic in a separate bowl until you have a consistent mixture. The sugar may not fully dissolve. (At this point you can add extra gin or lemon juice to taste).

When the cake is ready, place on a cooling rack and prick the surface of the cake with a skewer (or a fork if you don’t have a skewer). Spoon the syrup mixture over the cake and allow it to soak into the cake.

Halloween is one of my favourite holidays! I love everything about it, the costumes, jack-o-lanterns, ghoulish food, parties, trick-or-treating and best of all an excuse to watch as many horror movies as you want! It’s probably because I’m a massive horror movie fan – it’s pretty much how I was brought up and slightly inevitable with two older brothers (and the fact that my mother also loves a good horror/thriller). Movies of my childhood include: Chucky, It, Gremlins, Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th and Psycho, to name but a few. From there it’s extended to many many more.

Anyway, I encouraged the office to do something vaguely Halloween-y and unfortunately, despite originating in England, Halloween is not so big here, but some brought in treats and have some form of head decoration, so I’m happy with any effort! I’m dressed as a sort of modern witch in a wool grey-black dress with burgundy polk-dot tights, green eye shadow and of course a witches hat!

I brought it graveyard chocolate cupcakes, complete with little R.I.P tombstones, cheesy ghoul fingers, swamp guacamole, and vampire-proof dip (onion & garlic). I can’t say everything is home-made because I didn’t have enough hours in the day to make it all from scratch. The ghoul fingers are ‘home-made’… I bought the pastry but assembled & baked them myself.

Tombstones ready for icing! I used melted white chocolate.

I used green food colouring to give the almond nails a creepy ages look.

In fact, I have been eating rather gloriously over the last few months. Alas, I am still without a camera, so I’ve been cooking but I have no proof of it. Although I can talk about it quite well, so if you’ll excuse the text-heavy entry for the mean time.

Some new things:

Chilli-Lime Chickpeas – absolute fail. I found this recipe on an online blog so I can’t take credit for it. It involves roasting the chickpeas in the oven and then drowning them in a delicious chilli and lime marinade which makes for awesome snacking. Unfortunately the chickpeas burnt in the 10 minutes I had my full attention on Facebook. Fortunately I bought another can of chickpeas so it’s on the cards to try again soon!

Salsa. First time I’ve ever made salsa and I’m definitely going to make it again, so easy but so full of flavour.

Ina Garten’s warm Cider Vinagrette Butternut Squash Salad. It was good, but not as amazing as I would have thought. I guess it came out far too sweet for what I wanted for dinner and I guess it’s my fault slightly because I did sub some ingredients (it seems to be my vice at times), for example, I used goats cheese instead of parmesan and used a mixed seed (sesame, flax, pumpkin, sunflower) rather than the recommended walnuts. I also didn’t have any rocket salad (arugula to you American’s) so I used baby spinach instead. Overall, okay, but not gonna rush off my feet to make it again.

Low-fat Banana Muffins. Here we go, yes, I made banana bread again. But this time I thought I’d change it a little bit – muffins instead of bread and a low-fat variety so it’s not so sugary. They turned out great. Again, I subbed some ingredients – I used half wholewheat/half self-raising flour, mainly because I didn’t have any baking powder and then I added two more tablespoons than the recommended amount of apple sauce.

Pumpkin Soup – I added the other half of the butternut squash so it’s a touch sweeter than normal. I followed a recipe from my new Vegetarian Living magazine and it came out perfect. I’m gonna top it with the pumpkin seeds I roasted in the oven. I say I roasted them, I should give my ma some credit as she did that part as I was hacking away at the pumpkin. I seriously love pumpkin and squash but the fact that it’s so hard to peel and chop always puts me off getting it, especially if I don’t have much time. Fortunately I do right now because I’m unemployed, so I had plenty of time to chop at this unforgiving pumpkin.

Tomato Sauce (for pasta). My dad always buys me those ready-made tortellini/ravioli, which are good, but always so bland on their own. I decided to make up my own sauce which took about 10 minutes to make.

That said, I long for a good knife set! Something also worth saving money for!

I have to admit that because of my recent eating and lack of exercise I have gained some weight, so I am now on a diet. I say diet, I’m just trying to be a better veggie and to stop snacking so much. Today, for example, I had two banana muffins with apple syrup/butter (it’s a Dutch thing) for breakfast [at 11am, oops] and then at 4pm I ate a couple of crackers with humous. Dinner is gonna be pumpkin soup with more crackers or a slice of brown bread. Healthy healthy!

Onto some recipes:

Salsa:

You need a good knife and chopping board, or if you have a food processor then use that. My lowly student brain forgot that my parents’ kitchen actually had one until I had chopped up all the ingredients.

Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl or food processor. Let to sit in the fridge for an hour or so to let the flavours combine or eat straight away. It definitely tasted better the next day though.